


lift me up into your sky

by Taste_of_Suburbia



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alcoholic Tony Stark, Angst, Bucky's just trying to help, But he also loves Tony, Depression, Domestic, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Eventual Romance, Falling In Love, Families of Choice, Family, Friendship, Heart-to-Heart, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Past Steve/Tony, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Love Confessions, M/M, Pining, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Revelations, Romance, Some Steve and Avengers Bashing, Suicidal Thoughts, Trope Bingo Round 12, caring bucky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2020-04-06 19:59:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19069627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taste_of_Suburbia/pseuds/Taste_of_Suburbia
Summary: With Tony’s help, Bucky recovers a part of himself long thought lost forever.And hopefully, given hope and trust, Tony can open up just enough to allow Bucky to do the same for him.





	lift me up into your sky

**Author's Note:**

> Please check out mulin's lovely translation of my work [HERE](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20066632). 
> 
> This is a fill on my Trope Bingo [card](https://immolate-the-silence.dreamwidth.org/30129.html) for Chosen Family. 
> 
> Title and lyrics are from Vertical Horizon’s ‘Inside.’ 
> 
> I’m not one-hundred percent happy with this, but I definitely like it more than Avengers Endgame, so there.

 

_~Just one heart beats in us_

_With different names_

_Hold me inside_

‘ _Cause I want to be inside you~_

* * *

 

“Tones?”

Bucky’s fingers twitched unnervingly at the desire for contact, something he had rarely allowed himself or even ached for at all since HYDRA’S hold on him had  _mostly_ been broken. He hadn’t done  _this_ for a long time either: sympathy and concern and small displays of affection. Steve was usually the comforting type, a complete role reversal from when they had been nothing but punk kids longing for a cause and eager to prove themselves, a switch in personality from desperation to responsibility that Bucky was  _still_ trying to get used to. Steve had become the type of person who was steady and reassuring and listened without judgment, oozing confidence in all those things. 

He was usually the one  _trying_ to comfort Tony, or rather,  _had_ been. 

Bucky tried anyway, forced back to the surface memories that were more painful than sweet because of all the years that had passed and all the trials he had endured since then, memories of nursing Steve through numerous illnesses consisting of raging fevers and vivid hallucinations, his body fighting him for each year he dare draw breath and Bucky’s determination to keep him alive its only adversary.

So he remembered how badly he wanted to keep Steve alive and he  _tried_ this time for Tony’s sake. It was an entirely different situation, mental anguish rather than mere physical deterioration, but when Bucky cut it down to the bone it was all the same. Life had tried once before to take something that was Bucky’s. That threat of loss had been thwarted over and over again, until he had been lost to Steve instead, but Bucky was back in fighting mode again. He wouldn’t be deterred from Tony shying away from the comfort he so desperately needed. 

It was also one  _true_ thing that Bucky could cling to as always having been a part of him: not just a warrior, not  _just_ what the war and HYDRA made him but a  _caretaker_ , someone who wouldn’t let those he loved slip away, not while he could fight tooth and nail against death to pull them back from the brink and put them back on their feet again. 

And maybe Bucky had been brought back, had been given another chance, to be exactly here and to do exactly  _this_ . 

God knew if there was anyone he should try to save besides Steve - Stevie, who didn’t need saving anymore, hadn’t needed it for a  _long_ time - it was Tony. The once little boy whose parents he had slaughtered; the Avenger who had fought alongside Steve in his place; the  _broken_ , determined, selfless man who had let Bucky into his most private space with no malicious, vengeful intent, only wanting to help in the best way he knew how: weapons and the best high tech money could buy, not to mention nourishment and stability and a roof over Bucky’s head. The other Avengers valued the two former incentives highly, mere  _things,_ but Bucky didn’t care about what  _toys_ Tony could provide him with, he only cared about the home Tony let him have and the sense of peace and companionship that Tony exuded, even without words, even when he rambled and Bucky couldn’t understand any of it, even when Tony lashed out at him with sarcasm and barely concealed pain. 

And then Tony had made him an arm, one that wasn’t as fancy or efficient as the one Shuri had gifted to him, but it was a gesture that resulted in Bucky wearing it far more often, not to mention always coming up with something that needed to be added or fixed as an excuse to be around Tony when he was tinkering down in his workshop.

It was the safest space Bucky had found himself in since he’d recovered himself. Tony, sensing something to that effect, had generously extended an invitation to Bucky even when he was halfway across the world.

Still, Bucky preferred  _not_ to be alone, so he made it a point to make himself available when Tony was around, whether that was lending a hand or an ear, or putting his cooking skills to good use and feeding the other man when food was the last thing on his mind, which it usually was. When he extended his extensive cooking talents toward baking, well, then Tony was a  _bit_ more vocal about wanting to keep him around. 

It made Bucky feel wanted for something other than being a soldier turned warrior, for something other than just a cog in the machine to bring a mission to a successful close.

Domestic bliss. Whoever would have guessed that Bucky Barnes could have wanted such a thing, could covet it so much that he’d tear down anyone in his path who tried to take it away from him?

Who tried to take Tony from him, even Tony himself.

Bucky, finally realizing and coming to terms with the  _one_ thing he wanted, clamped down on it and vowed that he wouldn’t let go until he had attained it. He picked up on Tony’s habits and nagged at Jarvis until ‘Mr. Stark’s schedule has now been fully disclosed, Sergeant Barnes’ and cooked and baked until he was rattling off recipes to try to calm his mind before sleep instead of the idiotically unhelpful method of counting sheep. 

And it had worked so well for a few months, four perfectly blissful months until  _something_ had crumbled. 

Bucky knew the pressures bearing down mercilessly and persistently on Tony Stark from all sides, knew his constant struggle to separate his needs and goals from those of Iron Man, weighing in that the latter was often much more revered and respected and certainly more  _tolerated_ than the former, even while Tony told himself that he understood full well that distinction, even while Tony started believing that Iron Man was the be all and end all and that the man, the  _human_ had to be put last. He practically breathed in Tony’s claustrophobia and PTSD and even his fear of the dark, of what could come out of it, demons that plagued on Tony’s mind that Bucky had no part of, that Bucky wanted to battle regardless. 

Tony fixed everything around him, sparing no thought for himself unless he was on the verge of death and barely even then. Bucky had heard enough, Bucky had  _seen_ enough. Gaining Pepper’s trust had been a  _major_ milestone for him, learning of everything that had made Tony Stark into the man Bucky could call a friend standing before him. He had to use that knowledge to help Tony somehow, to keep Tony down here with him, in this space, appreciated and valued and  _loved._

So Bucky reached out again, fingers nearly brushing Tony’s hand until a pained look from the man startled him enough to jerk back.

Tony’s bloodless lips quirked up into a crooked smile, face going a whiter shade of pale, hand that Bucky wasn’t about to touch clenching even tighter around his latest mostly empty bottle.

And Bucky prickled and darkened and cursed the world for putting so much on this one man, even inflicting Bucky on him,  _especially_ inflicting HYDRA on him all those years ago. 

Tony was even more far gone than he thought, for him not to recoil from the murderous intent bleeding out of Bucky’s every pore, seeping out of his skin and into the air around them from where they lingered, crouched or sprawled, on the stairs leading down to Tony’s workshop that was a safe haven, an instinctual go-to space for them both.

“‘M fine, Bucks. Jus’ ‘sa lil’ tired is all…”

It was the understatement of the year: the dark half-circles under hollowed out eyes framed by wet-streaked eyelashes; the slump of limbs as they lay sprawled out before Bucky, where Tony was close enough to fall forward and rest his head in the crook of the warrior’s shoulder, if he wanted to; and the way a head tilted dangerously on a neck as if it was just too heavy to hold up anymore. In every agonizing look that Bucky endured there was the aura of defeat, of poisonous self-hatred and years-long exhaustion that ran bone deep and a sense of abandonment, completed and impending.

More than all of that, Bucky didn’t like how he was slurring his words, didn’t like to be reminded how Tony had turned to alcohol rather than to him, couldn’t blame him but  _did_ at the same time. 

_You’re not even trying._

But he had, far longer than Bucky had been here. Maybe it was cruel to ask Tony to do any more, to even keep it together for Bucky’s sake. And for what? To try to construct what was in Bucky’s every daydream: that domestic bliss, to make it real for Tony too?

He cupped Tony’s chin in his hand, not moving him, not pulling him any closer, just to feel the scratch of days worth of stubble, harsh and unforgiving. Just so Tony could really  _see_ him, not as a figment of his imagination. 

Genius billionaire playboy… whatever the media dubbed him. Avenger, futurist, mechanic, fighter.

_Human._

_We aren’t machines. We’re people. We save the world, over and over again, but what’s there at the end of the day for us? What can there be at the end of the road other than failure and death?_

It was at times like these, when words were so desperately needed to break through Tony’s fractured psyche, that Bucky tried to think what Steve would say. Steve wasn’t much of a talker himself, Bucky had taken up most of the words in their early years, but he seemed to always know what to say to the other Avengers to get them ready for battle or calm them down or even most importantly, to get them to trust him.

It never ceased to amaze Bucky or make him proud.

It also, like now, made him  _insanely_ jealous and pissed off. 

“Steve doesn’t like it when you do this to yourself, Tony.” His tone darkened, despite his attempts to come across slower and more delicately. “And I don’t either.”

Tony seemed to pull in on himself and that was maybe what hurt Bucky the most. Whether it was from him mentioning Steve or just by forcing Tony to look at the mess he was so stupidly and carelessly slipping and sliding in, Bucky didn’t really care.

There was only so much he could do. He hadn’t grown up with Tony, didn’t have his trust enough to  _make_ him listen, didn’t have that brotherly bond that he had with Steve but  _wanted_ to have it with Tony, more than anything. 

Could he make it count, make it  _real,_ make Tony realize that  _wanting_ something could make it count? 

Or was it all just Bucky’s immaculately constructed pipe dream?

_Now would be the absolute_ worst  _time to tell him what I want, how I feel, how I see him._

_But what if it’s the_ only  _way?_

Tony seemed to sense the shift in Bucky, from anger to sorrow, from frustration to desperation, and he yanked himself away from Bucky’s touch, stumbling back against the wall but no more moving away from Bucky than that. His face was as livid as it could be, warring against exhaustion and his frail, malnourished, overworked body’s limits, and in his eyes was a look of betrayal that Bucky wouldn’t have found so easy to ignore if those same eyes weren’t glazed over with the onset of fever. “I don’t want your pity,” the man spat out, recognition flickering in and out of his consciousness, judging by his occasionally vacant expression that was more often pained as he clutched onto reality.

This wasn’t Bucky’s turn to retreat.

“Then stop drowning yourself in the nearest bottle!” Bucky snapped, anger crackling like lightning in the over-heated, cramped space they had been delegated to waste away in. He couldn’t help it. He knew this wasn’t how Steve would approach Tony’s drinking problem, only fueled forever forward by his lack of self-worth and excess of guilt and a cluttered head tormented by nightmares and horrible memories and expectations that he knew would crush him long before he lived up to them and…

Bucky was standing in the mess of it all and he couldn’t hold it all back, couldn’t prevent all or really  _any_ of it from touching Tony. 

He hated that Tony did this to himself, sometimes even more than he hated HYDRA, not a comforting thought even though HYDRA was the furthest thing from pressing on his mind anymore. He hated that Tony was such a good and talented and capable and giving and  _selfless_ person and had to be cursed with all of this  _bullshit,_ half of it given to him on a daily basis by the other Avengers themselves. 

And he hated even more how Tony couldn’t cope when life socked him in the face without a strong drink and a mask that Bucky could see now was so cracked around the edges it was already bleeding.

And that very mask was a  _huge_ part of what was killing him. 

Tony ran a trembling hand over his face and tried - and failed - to prop himself more securely against the wall. “If I want to drink myself into a coma what do you care?”

It was the most callous thing he could have said because he  _knew_ that Bucky cared, maybe not the exact degree, maybe not enough to believe that Bucky would never up and leave, but Bucky had spent more time with Tony than he had with anyone else in the last four months. And he  _knew_ Tony knew that. 

But no matter how horrible it was to hear, it sounded more pitiful than anything in Tony’s current drunken state. The man laid so painfully bare before him sniffed wetly and Bucky’s heart, fluttering like a caged bird in his tight chest, nearly leaped out of his chest and fell into a nonexistent puddle of Tony’s tears.

Bucky did realize that he was here strictly out of Tony’s hospitality. Steve was on the go too much - burying himself in the next assignment and the next after that - to have a permanent home. He bunked wherever he could lay his head and Bucky got it, he’d had to rely on that for most of his life too, but then he couldn’t do it anymore, no matter how dejected Steve had been when Bucky chose to stay where Steve himself had put him, once they had  _relatively_ patched things up with Tony. 

And from that moment when Steve had dropped him smack dab on Tony’s doorstep, Bucky had never really thought about moving on to anyplace else.

He had spent a long while wondering why that was. He had grown to like Tony, leading to a need to watch over him. He just had never imagined that he’d go back to babysitting like he’d once looked after Steve. But Tony didn’t exactly have anyone else in his life  _but_ Bucky. Sure, Pepper and Rhodey were never more than a phone call away - and they  _always_ kept their phones on for Tony - but they were just as busy and didn’t exactly  _exude_ stability, not like Bucky could, not like Bucky  _wanted_ to. Steve had left, pissed off with Tony’s spiraling attitude, and gradually the rest of the team had given up on Tony too, once his lingering drinking problem had kicked in. 

Bucky was the only one who had  _stayed,_ the only one left really to pick up the jagged, alcohol sloshed pieces of Tony Stark. 

Still, it didn’t mean that he had to watch Tony dig his own hole either.

“It’s okay to be  _weak_ , Tony.”

Tony’s gaze slithered away to a random part of the wall behind Bucky. “Funny how Dad never had much room for weakness,” Tony cut into him with one fiercely sharp slice, spoken so bitterly that Bucky was afraid to breathe, almost terrified of what he would do to that prick if he were standing right in front of him ‘cause yeah, he knew about him laying a hand on Tony a time or two, suspected the verbal deprecations, not to mention his repeated attempts to bully Tony into becoming his perfect machine, building and building until Tony was all but buried under Howard Stark’s achievements and the persistent message that Tony’s were never good enough.

_Oh yeah, that’s right, I killed him._

_Should have taken a much longer time of doing it too._

He dug his nails into his palms, waited until he could feel blood there, until he could latch onto the fraying threads of his sanity before he continued. “It’s okay to feel like you’re not in control.”

It wasn’t okay, not for Bucky anyway, he still felt every  _single_ one of those deaths, but it  _was_ a fact of life. 

“Please leave,” Tony gritted out, but it was apparent that it was taking all of his strength to push Bucky away by the way he was cradling his head in both hands and trying his hardest  _not_ to look at him. 

There was a part of Bucky that deemed leaving as the best option, that wanted to say to hell with the absolute fucking  _mess_ that was Tony Stark. 

But every morning Bucky woke up in his own bed and own room and hell, even his own  _floor_ , provided by Tony; ate three meals a day like some miracle, where he had a mind-blowing amount of options grocery-wise to order from FRIDAY and in an unlimited capacity, and could even use Tony’s state of the art kitchen to his heart’s content, all provided by Tony; and tinkered around in Tony’s workshop either alone or with company,  _also_ provided by Tony. 

And yet it wasn’t fucking guilt or gratitude.

He didn’t want to wake up and  _not_ have Tony on the floor below his, in the communal kitchen, hiding out in his workshop but never selfish enough to shove Bucky out, not even when he had offered to build Bucky his own. 

He didn’t really want to leave this new life,  _his_ new life with Tony Stark. 

So Bucky called him out on his bullshit like any good, true friend would, like Steve should be here doing, like Bucky wished he could have done before Tony found it in his thick skull to drink again. “You don’t really want me to leave, Tony.”

Tony’s head lifted then, sorrowful eyes nearly dragging Bucky down into those same sad depths. Bucky almost wished he hadn’t. That hollowed out look in his eyes? It sent chills down Bucky’s spine. “Those papers I had you sign the other day?” Bucky honed in on the day before last, when Tony had shoved some papers in his face, rambling about a dozen different things and Bucky had just signed them, not to get rid of the bearer of them, but just because Tony had looked more agitated than usual and Bucky wanted to give him  _one_ last thing to worry about. In the mess of those rambles, he remembered details about  _another_ kitchen remodeling and a minor expansion of Bucky’s floor and just about everything Tony hinted at sounded not just  _okay_ but amazingly generous enough  _not_ to warrant much thought behind some simple signatures. 

And should he be regretting  _not_ reading those papers now? 

“They’re this place and everything in it.”

Yeah, he definitely  _should_ have read them before he blindly put pen to paper. 

Every emotion flooded out of Bucky until there was nothing left but horror, a deep, icy, bone-splitting horror. Bucky had practically lost the ability - seen too damn much,  _done_ too damn much - to be shocked by anything anymore, so what were the odds that Bucky’s most important person in the world right now was completely kicking the crap out of him, figuratively speaking… and winning? 

“Tony, what are you playing at?” Was this a test, a way to see whether Bucky was delusional enough to think that Tony would throw it all away and give it all to him, not to Pepper or Rhodey or Bruce or Steve or anyone else  _other_ than him? 

“It’s better this way.”

Not a test then. Just another reason for Bucky to get angry. Just another obstacle in the path to his future happiness, the one person whom he wanted to share it with now the one person thwarting it.

It didn’t make any sense. Then again, nothing Tony had done for him since Bucky had been given a home here made much sense, including the  _being given a home_ part, emphasis being on  _home_ and not just a place to lay his head for a night or two and then pack his bag and move on. 

It did make sense in the context of Tony’s downward spiral, a sick sort of sense that  _obviously_ Tony wasn’t thinking clearly and  _obviously_ maybe he imagined that Bucky was the only one he cared, given that he was the sole person who had seen Tony in probably, what, the last month? Not to mention, one of the very few for far longer than that. 

And how could that break a person? Among all the other things that were  _trying_ to break Tony Stark. 

“Tony, what the hell are you playing at?”

Tony sighed, this rasping, resigned sigh that probably scared Bucky more than any words ever could, as final as those words may have sounded. “Just that you don’t have to worry. Just that you won’t have to worry if you’ll be homeless if something happens.”

_And what about me worrying about_ you?  _Or do I just not have the capability in that head of yours to worry about you?_

And now it was all coming out, like the stopper being pulled out of a sink and all the water raining down on Bucky so fast that he could barely breathe, let alone keep his head up above it. All of Tony’s deep-seated issues: his fear of abandonment; his guilt toward all the damage he had caused; his sorrow that he could never be enough for anyone; his fear of what the world was going to inflict on him next; his desperation to find some way out, even if that way was drowning himself in bottle after bottle, even if it was setting Bucky up for a future that could never be a future at all without Tony Stark.

He needed to stop this, to shut this down.

Now.

“You honestly think I care about that, Tony? After all this time? That I’m only here because of a bed and gadgets and food?”  _Just a basket case in need of some peace and quiet and minimal violent activities, at least until he got his head screwed on straight, if that ever happened enough for everyone’s comfort._

No.  _No._ This wasn’t about him. This was about  _Tony._

How much of a fool was Tony to think that Bucky was just here for what he could get? How much of a fool was Bucky for not seeing it earlier? Tony was a hard person to _see_ though, even after all the details Bucky had pried out of him and gleaned from Pepper, Rhodey and Happy. “Tony,” he reached out again, wanted to _touch_ the other man, not afraid of his jagged edges, wanted to cup his feverish, stubbled cheek in his hand, his _flesh_ hand; wanted to catch Tony’s tears that were threatening to spill over in his palm when they _did_ fall, but he wasn’t sure if he should this time. Tony always closed off in the worst moments, and if Bucky even went just that little bit too far then Tony might shut him out entirely. He’d come too far already. 

But Bucky was done asking questions and he was done sitting on his heels waiting for the bitter alcoholic Tony had become to make a move. It was time for Bucky to talk, for Bucky to make impossible decisions, for Bucky to  _act._ “You’re not giving up, okay? You’re just not.”

_Easy to be controlled, but never easy_ to  _control._

Tony went back to staring at the wall as if he was willing Bucky away so he wouldn’t be disappointed when he  _actually_ left because, of course, to Tony Stark  _that_ was inevitable. “Steve gets a piece of it too.”

And Bucky knew that Steve didn’t want it either, but he also knew that Steve should be here right damn now and saying that to the man himself. But no, he had given up on Tony and took off, but not before dumping Bucky here. And why had he? Was it because Tony had the capabilities and know how to fix his arm, why not just leave him in Wakanda then? Or was it because Steve imagined that Tony could somehow  _fix_ Bucky? 

And  _had_ Tony? Bucky could admit to finally feeling settled somewhere, to wanting to get better and not just to show Steve that when he got back from his latest whatever the hell it was he was doing. 

He wanted to be friends with Tony first and foremost but he had to  _earn_ that friendship, and maybe all of this was his way of doing just that. 

And still, Bucky only shook his head in disbelief. He didn’t really know what to do, what to  _say._ “I don’t want it, Tony. That’s not why I’m here. Don’t you know that by now? If I’ve taken advantage of you, I’m sorry.” Hands clasped his knees, fingers digging into his skin in  _shame._ “I’m so sorry.”

Tony gave him this apologetic, guilt-ridden stare. “That’s not what it’s about, Bucks. I don’t regret you coming here. I don’t think you’ve taken advantage. I’m… glad you’re here really. Just not that glad I dragged you into all my shit.”

Bucky rolled his eyes, though he also sorta felt like curling up into this small ball where no one and nothing could touch him, screaming until it was all over. “It’s not all shit, Tony.”  _It’s good. It’s working. This is all working._

It’s not at all working for Tony.

“It is though.”

“Tony,” he pleaded. “I’m  _here_ , okay? And I  _want_ to stay. I want to help. Don’t you think I would’a left with Stevie the last time he was here if I didn’t? You’re my friend. And right now that means a whole helluva lot given Steve isn’t here and I am.”

It was a low blow against Steve but he was just that pissed to make it.

“That’s nice,” Tony droned, distantly, painfully.

Bucky fumed, but he grasped his anger tight and yanked it back inside. “I like you a lot, Tony, okay? I feel like a jerk for saying it now, to be selfish enough to think that it’ll change anything, but I  _like_ you, even maybe more than just being friends.” He spoke the last seven words clearer than he’d thought possible, but rushing through them wouldn’t make them sound anything close to truthful to Tony. 

Still, the silence was almost more than Bucky could bear, a silence where Tony alternated between gazing intently at the wall and staring at Bucky in distant disbelief. It was hard to read Tony much beyond that.

_Don’t bolt, don’t bolt don’t bolt don’t bolt, don’t you dare…_

“Bucky,” Tony broke off, tried again and it was then that Bucky glanced up. “I…”

“You don’t… have to say anything, really. You’ve  _more_ than done enough for me, Tony, more than I ever would have thought it possible for  _one_ man to give.”

Tony seemed to snap back to complete awareness at that. “Bucky, you don’t want this. Not really. Not long-term anyway. You don’t want  _me._ ”

Goddamn  _bastard._ “I’ve thought about it, Tony, believe me I  _have_ and I  _do._ ” 

“But you and Steve…”

“ _Leave_ Steve out of this, Tony,” he warned, he begged for all the sense Tony still had left in him. Did he talk about he and Stevie growing up from time to time? Yes. Did he ramble on and on about how great Steve was? No. He wouldn’t do that to Tony because to Bucky, Tony was just as fascinating and important and deserving of his time  _as_ Steve was. 

Rather than retreat, as Bucky expected, Tony pulled himself up out of the hole he had started digging for himself and spoke pretty coherently. “I can’t want you, Bucky. I can’t let myself do it because then I’ll ruin your life somehow, somewhere down the road, just give it time. Probably not even  _that_ much time.”  _So he does_ want  _to want me? This is_ not  _a time for smiling._ “I could even get you killed. Do you know how many people out there, how many  _lifeforms_ want me dead?” 

_And clearly you don’t know all of the people and lifeforms and whoever the hell else is out there that wants_ me  _dead. Besides, I can take care of myself._

“After all I’ve done to you, Tony, it still amazes me that I’m even here. God knows I want to do whatever I can to help you. I just don’t think you realize how amazing you are, how caring and kind and generous. Has anyone ever told you that? Steve shouldn’t have left but  _I_ stayed, and really, Tony, I don’t expect anything. I  _never_ did. I just want you to appreciate yourself, to just stop for  _once_ and think about what you need and about what you want, without even factoring in the Iron Man or the Avengers or the world.” 

“Bucks…,”

But Bucky wasn’t done yet.

“I don’t even know  _if_ I’m ready to be with anyone, but if I am then I want to be with you. I’m willing to give it a shot, Tony, because we have  _so much_ in common, so much pain that we both share, that stems from the same place, even  _not_ factoring in what I did. I don’t think Steve is going to make me a better man, Tony. I think  _you_ are.”

And it just might have been the defining statement of his life. That the road he had been forced to take had always led him to Tony Stark in one way or another couldn’t be a mistake, it just  _couldn’t._

And if there was anything that could make Tony crawl into a shell, far from where Bucky could touch him, it would be  _that._

Still, Tony needed to hear it.

And then Tony did something entirely unexpected. “I don’t think I ever understood the consequences Steve was willing to pay, the friendships he was willing to destroy for you… but I get it now,” he sighed. “I do like you, Bucky. Hell, I’m _crazy_ about you, but you’ve probably been able to tell as much, with how often I keep you around.” He smiled crookedly, peeking up at Bucky and the latter gave him the brightest, most encouraging and flattering grin he could offer under the present circumstances. “But I don’t… I don’t do this, okay? If you want grand gestures and expensive dinners and trips halfway across the world then I’m your guy. I don’t know how to say…”

“I love you?” Bucky blurted, heart hammering wildly in his chest because Tony had admitted there was a reason he kept him around, just because he  _wanted_ to, and suddenly Bucky’s heart was swelling and swelling and swelling until it was about to burst straight out of his chest. 

Tony took a huge breath and then blew it out. “Yeah. That.”

Bucky laughed and dared to pretend that this was a normal conversation, just the two of them down in  _their_ workshop, tinkering and talking like the world outside those walls didn’t matter, that it had tried so hard to tear them down and separate them yet held no sway over them anymore. 

He laughed, swiping at his eyes quickly, imagining a romantic dinner where Tony got everything right except for him stumbling over the right words. He could picture himself one-upping Tony because even though he wasn’t good with words, never had anything to say, didn’t want to  _waste_ them unnecessarily, he  _could_ speak from the heart, given it would be one of the only things worth using words for. “I’m okay with grand gestures, really,” he admitted. Anything to distract Tony for a while. Sure, he wasn’t crazy about the guy throwing his money around to buy trust and loyalty, reasons for the other Avengers to keep him around, but he’d take any way that Tony was willing to connect with him. 

And then he realized that Tony  _had_ connected with him in this way: expanding Bucky’s floor, one kitchen upgrade and another on the horizon, offering to build Bucky his own workshop, and probably several dozen other things that Bucky’s couldn’t name at that second. 

He finally grasped Tony’s hand and he was allowed, Tony flustered but acquiescent. “I don’t deserve your promises, Tony. Just… don’t do anything stupid tonight. Come in the kitchen with me and help me make popcorn, if you want, and then we can talk or watch movies or whatever. Can we do that? Can you give me a chance to do something for you other than make you a sandwich? Can you give me a chance to be who I want to be?”  _Who I’ve been these last four months with you._ “Just one chance, even if it’s just for tonight?”

He knew he was playing with fire, trying to steer Tony away from the bottle, playing with Tony fucking Stark. He knew Steve would frown at him and tell him to tread carefully, tell him  _it’s not worth it, Buck_ as if he were saying that Tony wasn’t worth it, warning him  _don’t get your hopes up. We’ve all tried, Buck, just don’t think you’re gonna make a difference, changing him. Tony doesn’t change._

_But he did, Steve,_ he should’ve said. He should’ve said  _weeks_ ago.  _He did change._

_He changed for_ me _._

And just like in a dream, the bottle dropped and then met the stairs and rolled all the way down until Bucky could hear it collide against a wall. Bucky didn’t take his eyes off Tony, didn’t speak, didn’t dare breathe until… “Yeah, you can. Popcorn sounds kinda nice right about now. You pick the movie.”

Because, of course, Tony had to generous about  _that_ too. 

But Bucky didn’t grin or laugh or even smile too brightly.  _You’ve pushed it far enough tonight, just go with the flow for the rest of it._ “Sounds like a plan,” he agreed with a nonchalant tone, like they were talking about the weather except… he held out an open palm for Tony to take. Tony stared at it for a long minute as if rethinking his promise to Bucky, but then he grasped it with both his hands, allowing a boost up. He swayed a bit but Bucky held him in place.

He knew the real Tony Stark, the kind and caring and genuine and yes, damaged but not irreparably, man, but the one who didn’t look at Bucky like  _he_ was damaged and fragile and nothing more than HYDRA’S murderous pet. 

Bucky wanted him all the more.

**FIN**

 

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [lift me up into your sky 拥我入怀](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20066632) by [mulin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mulin/pseuds/mulin)




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